This reminds me of the original proposed Red Line extension to East LA, that the Fed's pulled the funding on, because of high cost and limited connectivity. It was down to a two station heavy rail subway extension out to only Soto, for $1.8 billion, to add only 2,200 daily riders. It had finally shrunk to such a short segment, that carried so few passengers, and yet still cost so much, that it finally just "fell off" the end of the FRA funding cost effectiveness chart....

Even if these projects are not seeking Federal funds, they really should use the FTA funding criteria cost effectiveness index to assess where they would rank, in these kind of cost per passenger metrics, as a "reality check". It is the kind of exercise that can help prevent this kind of ludicrous "cost per passenger" investment.

VTA has never had very high marks from me, too much "build it an they will come", without a good picture of how this would all work, when they got the parts built. Too much "let's go here" and "let's go there" "planning", that was "light" on realistic future travel demand analysis and trip patterns. of course, this "build it and they will come" at VTA came from some of the very same political visionaries, that were involved in the CAHSRA fiasco, based on much of the same "quality" of politically inspired "visionary" "analysis"....

It's really a very sad commentary, especially if you think we deserve better rail and transit in CA or the US. This is because every taxpayer dollar being pissed away on this kind of high marginal cost per passenger project, is being spent, at the expense of other worthwhile rail projects, with a much lower cost per passenger, cost per passenger mile, passenger time savings, or operator cost savings.

We are professionals, do not try this at home.....